


T Team Team Up

by taskmaster



Category: Marvel
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-19
Updated: 2015-08-19
Packaged: 2018-04-15 13:09:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,462
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4607976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taskmaster/pseuds/taskmaster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU where Tasky rescues Tommy from the detention facility instead of the Young Avengers</p>
            </blockquote>





	T Team Team Up

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first time ever writing fanfiction, so be gentle! Any constructive criticism would be greatly appreciated.

“As soon as I get outta here i’m gonna strangle that Weasel” muttered Taskmaster as the safe he had just cracked turned out to be completely empty. Well to be fair it’s not completely empty, there are a couple of cockroaches going at it in the corner. In frustration, he punched a nearby dresser. Splintering the corner of the wood.

Wade’s lackey had sworn up and down that the haul of the century was just collecting dust at this detention facility. Deadpool probably put the little weasel up to it. Prank ol’ Tasky, not like he’s got enough bullshit to deal with already. S.H.I.E.L.D. had just raided his latest villain school last week and he had to find a new property before he could open back up for business. Hence why he was hitting up Weasel for leads.

He gently closed the safe door, not that it really mattered, but old habits you know. Anything to throw the guards off his track even for a minute or two could be the difference between life or death. But hey at least he hadn’t wasted the C4 on the safe since he was able to crack it himself. If all else fails he could use it to make a quicker getaway. Or to blow this shithole up out of spite. That second option was seeming better by the second.

“The hell with this dump, I’ve already sunk this much time into this shithole. May as well try to make it worth my while” said Taskmaster to himself as he decided to search the facility more closely. If he couldn’t find something valuable to take with him, he could at least find a good load bearing wall to help him bury this place.

_Wait a minute._

As he rounded the corner he could feel a slight change in the air. Taskmaster started groping the wall trying to find the secret entrance that was leaking cold air.

_This could take hours._

_Think Tasky! Think! Okay you stole the blueprints to this place just picture the blueprints. If you were gonna have a secret dungeon where would you put the entrance?_

“I’d put it… right here” he said aloud as he turned to the outside corner.

“I saw Captain America do this once, and I’ve been itching to try it myself ever since” said Taskmaster to himself as he took off his cape and let it fall to the ground. The ceiling seemed just the right height for this maneuver.

Taskmaster backtracked down the hall and took a deep breath before running towards the wall in a full sprint. About halfway down the hall he launched his osmium shield full force at a 45 degree inclination angle into the left wall and leaped into the air towards the right wall. He kicked off the wall back towards the center of the hallway- except now airborne, and tucked in his legs. He's slightly slower than his ricocheting shield so it was slightly in front of him, at this point. When he met his shield in the center he shoved his legs downward, to jump off his shield and he started spinning himself further upwards into the air towards the ceiling. This also had the added benefit of sending his shield downward to ricochet back up again later. Taskmaster spent a moment adjusting his spin velocity by stretching out his limbs a bit so that he'd be sure to reach the ceiling while upside down. As he approached the ceiling, he once again kicked off the hard surface, propelling himself down towards the wall at a declination of 45 degrees. Just as he kicked off his shield caught up to him again and he braced himself for the finale. As he rocketed forward he grabbed his shields straps and held it out in front of him. He again tucked his legs up as he became a human cannonball, albeit a cannonball with arms holding onto a shield for dear life. Finally he crashed into the wall with as much force as a human could possibly muster.

The moment of impact seemed to drag on for a few seconds. He could hear the sounds of something crunching and what sounded like a far off demolition project. He began to worry if he had broken his shield instead of the wall.

Finally time stopped standing still. And the sounds of demolition were much closer now. All he could hear was a ringing in both ears as he coughed up approximately 20 pounds of dust from out of his lungs. His arms felt a little shaky- not that he'd ever admit that to anyone.

But despite all that, Taskmaster couldn’t help but grin from under his mask. “Suck on that, Rogers” he growled out between coughing fits. The wall was obliterated, leaving only a gaping hole wide enough to march three men through abreast. What was left standing of the wall was spidered with cracks and crumbling. Behind the hole was his prize: a dimly lit yet surprisingly well air conditioned stairwell led to a lower area of the facility.

Taking a moment to catch his breath and admire his work, Taskmaster then slowly sauntered over to his fallen cape and donned it once more.

“Let’s see what’s behind door number two then, shall we?”

Taskmaster dusted himself off and headed down the stairwell. The medieval looking cobblestone stairway definitely clashed with the modern looking facility. Whoever had designed this obviously had no eye for aesthetics.

 

His boots made a resounding thud on each of the cobblestone steps, a thud that seemed to echo without end. Normally he’d scold himself for his lack of tact on this mission. But he was too intrigued to care at the moment. Besides, this place was horribly managed. He’d only seen two guards on his way to the safe and none after that.

The stairs finally came to end, at a cobblestone archway. Torches flickered from the stairwell and from the room they led into.

Taskmaster doused the torches from the bottom of the stairwell, and pulled a bottle from a special polymer casing. Careful not to drop the bottle or to let it touch him, he tied it to an arrowhead and took aim. He shot the Adhesive X arrow at the sole torch from the room beyond, plunging the dungeon into complete darkness.

_First try_

Taskmaster heard someone mumbling something once the lights went out.

_so there are guards down here too… interesting. The good stuff must be down here then._

He quieted those thoughts for now and quickly shifted his night vision equipment on. Two people were registering in this room. The one on his left seemed to be reclining… the oaf was sound asleep.

_probably one of my dropouts, the whole lot of my students are too lazy to make it as career criminals_

Tasky decided to focus on the conscious enemy before immobilizing the heavy sleeper, just in case. He turned to the right and saw metal bars… prison bars? The awake one was a prisoner?

Revising his previous plan, Taskmaster bound and gagged sleeping beauty over there before turning off the night vision equipment and relighting the torch. He brought the light to the cell.

_Jesus Christ! It’s a kid!_

The kid’s hands and feet were both shackled to an oversized metal ball.

_I can’t believe those things are actually real_

The shackles weren’t just cheap metal shackles either, they looked high tech and as far as he could guess were emitting a dampening field of some sort.

As well as being shackled, the kid was also gagged and his bright green clothes were in tatters. Whatever this kid was down here for, it hadn’t been pretty on his end.

"Kid, who the hell are you and why are they keeping you down here?” whispered Taskmaster to the prisoner

The flickering torchlight danced off a pair of the angriest green eyes Tasky had ever seen. Well if you wanna get technical, they were the second angriest green eyes he'd ever seen. He’d had the displeasure of seeing the Hulk up close and personal before. As the kid stared daggers at him, he decided against his better judgement to ungag him.

_Pretty dumbass move asking questions while he’s still gagged_

_OH SHIT, what if he’s a dumbass kid that screams for help or something and blows it for the both of us?_

The thought gave Taskmaster a moment’s hesitation as his fingers hovered just above the kid’s gag

“Okay listen kid! I’m gonna take this gag off and you’re not gonna scream or do anything dumb you promise?” he whispered then waited for confirmation.

The kid just kept glaring up at him until after a few moments, he gave a reluctant nod

_Phew_

“Okay now i’m gonna take this gag off, you’re gonna give me some short and sweet answers and then i’m gonna get us both outta here okay?”

Another nod, this time nearly immediately

_Quick learner, i think i like this kid_

Taskmaster deftly untied the disgusting rag that had been gagging the poor kid

“For starters, what’s your name?”

At first the kid just kept maneuvering his tongue in his mouth, probably to try to moisten his throat. Taskmaster guessed he needed some water and made his way to the sleeping guard and pinched a water bottle off the mook.

Wordlessly, Taskmaster reentered the cell and offered the prisoner the water.

 

_How much of a goddamn idiot can i be today? handing a shackled kid water like a moron get it together Tasky_

Taskmaster sighed and then moved to hold the water bottle at a slight angle to the kid’s lips and waited for the kid to hum to signal he’d had enough. No hum ever came and the kid ended up draining the whole bottle in one go.

As he set the empty bottle on the ground the kid began to talk,

“The name’s… Tommy... Tommy... Shepherd, I… I go by… Speed though… and… I’m here because… I…accidentally…vaporized my school… they do tests…and experiments…here…trying…to make me…a weapon” mumbled the kid, err Tommy.

His words seemed sluggish like they were being dragged out of him slowly almost like waiting for honey to fall from the jar.

“Can…you…get…these…off?” Tommy mumbled again, while slowly nodding toward the humming shackles.

 

_Accidentally vaporized his school? I wonder if he’s related to Wade… Must have powers of some sort, poor kid._

_I wonder if the guard has the keys?_

Again Taskmaster made his way to the sleeping guard and gave him a thorough pat down. Which is hard when the guard was sleeping in a chair. Nonetheless, no keys on him.

_Of course not, that’d be too easy_

Taskmaster looked over the high tech shackles. He was no Tony Stark, but he had had foresight enough to copy Black Cat’s lockpicking techniques before this mission. He began coaxing a lockpick through one of the locks on the hand shackles. Carefully feeling for a tumbler, with a soft click he applied pressure et voila! the kids hands were freed!

Immediately, Tommy began massaging his wrists as Taskmaster moved to duplicate his success on the feet shackles. Another moment of careful probing, another soft click, and the boy was free at last.

Now that he was up close to the shackles, Taskmaster noticed the Hammer Industries logo on the contraptions.

_Typical Hammer. All this fancy high tech mojo and you still skimp out and use a cheap mechanical lock for the thing._

 

“Okay, you’re no longer a prisoner here, I’m getting you outta here. I don’t care about your school. Just tell me if you have any powers I should know about?” Taskmaster once again whispered to the kid as the walked together up the stairwell.

“Well I uh… I can run fast” Tommy replied halfheartedly.

“Tch you’re a speedster and your name is Speed” Taskmaster said with a chuckle, “real original.”

“Well, what about you old man? Who are you and what do you do?” asked Tommy in rapid succession.

“Well the name’s Taskmaster. And what I do, well it’s kinda complicated. I got this… memory thing. I pick up anyone’s moves just by seein’ ‘em”

“you're one to talk then!" Tommy blurted out immediately.

Taskmaster cocked his head in confusion and the boy elaborated, "You master other people’s tasks and you named yourself Taskmaster! What was Copycat already taken?”

“Okay first of all, yeah it is already taken. Although, she might still be dead for all I know. It’s damn hard to keep track these days, especially with mutants. Secondly, when you’re that freaking short you don’t get to make fun of me.” Taskmaster retorted to the emerald pipsqueak, who had to crane his neck up to make up for the whole foot difference in height.

They climbed the dimly lit stairwell as they talked until they reached the doorway Taskmaster had created earlier.

“Woah! Did you do this??” asked Speed with awe in his voice

Taskmaster couldn’t help but feel pride welling up inside himself, “Yeah, it was pretty cool if I say so myself. I’ll have to show you sometime”

“Sounds great! It’s a shame you wasted your explosives blowing this entrance up when the switch is right over there though…” Speed said before choking back a laugh and pointing at an inconspicuous tile down the hallway.

Taskmaster suddenly felt himself blushing as he checked the tile the kid had pointed to, he pried the tile up to reveal a small green button underneath.

_Son of a bitch!_

"Well jokes on you, pintsize! I didn't have to use any explosives... just these guns" Taskmaster said jokingly while flexing to hide his embarrassment

_You're literally wearing a mask numbnuts nobody can see you blush remember?_

"Whatever helps you sleep at night, grandpa" retorted Tommy after a slight chuckle.

 

_It's good to see the kid laughing, his clothes are still mostly holes at this point but he's gotten color back in his cheeks so that's good._

Suddenly alarms started blaring and red lights flashing down the halls

"Emergency! Prisoner escape in progress! All personnel to the South Wing immediately" blared an automated feminine voice over the intercoms.

_Shit_

_"_ Shit!" exclaimed Tommy.

Before the kid even had time to ask what the plan was, ten footsoldiers rounded the corner about fifty yards away with their guns drawn.

 

"How fast did you say you could run" asked Taskmaster

"No way! I'm not leaving some old geezer to be gunned down for saving me!"

_Kid's loyal, I'll give him that_

 

"Don't worry, kid. I got no plans on dying. Besides I could take care of these mooks blindfolded... But if you're hellbent on staying, how about you show me what you can do?"

Before the words had even left Taskmaster's mouth, the bruised and battered speedster sped off towards the soldiers. A flesh colored blur that closed the distance immediately.

He must've punched one guard in the gut as he sped past the rest, dude went flying into the back wall leaving a crater.

_Remind me not to get on his bad side, holy shit!_

Immediately, Speed spun around and yelled "Catch" to his new partner

_Catch? Catch what? He doesn't mean--_

Before he even had time to finish that thought, a guard went flying towards him.

With less than a moment's notice, Taskmaster instinctively rolled out of the way and the guard went flying down the stairway.

_Well that ones definitely dead, gonna break his neck thirty different ways on those stairs- this kid doesn't hold back_

 

 

"YOU WANTED A WEAPON, WELL HERE I AM!" shouted Tommy, his voice booming like thunder down the hall for Taskmaster to hear.

He uppercut one guard into the ceiling, Another he pounded into the ground. Only two of the ten were left standing. 

_Holy shit!_

Speed raced over to one of the remaining two, and did.... something. There was a sickening splat and then just blood and guts everywhere

_I run fast he said. You forgot to mention super strength and the ability to make people fucking explode_

Speed turned to the last guard, who was just trembling in fear at this point.

"That was over too quick... What say we take our time and experiment on you, hmm?"

_How's this the same kid I was joking around with earlier?_

The guard gulped and grabbed his walkie, "The escapee is Speed!"

"Haha yes please invite all your friends to this party! The more the merrier" spat the kid before delivering a decisive kick to the guard's sternum

_Kid's got anger issues, but then again so do I._

 

The kid's breaths become labored as the adrenaline began to leave his system. Taskmaster walked over to the traumatized teen

Tommy looked around at the destruction he'd just caused, "Oh god, they were right! I am a monster" he wailed!

Before Taskmaster could try to console his partner the alarms blared again

The red lights changed to green as the feminine voice started up again

"Escaping prisoner identified as subject Speed. Speed protocols activated."

With that Tommy let out a sharp cry in pain, the color draining from his cheeks once more

"No... not... again..." his words dragging on like honey once more

_Another dampening field, eh_

 

"Look kid, you ain't the monster here. They're the monsters for experimenting on you... You're just getting your dues outta their flesh, nothing wrong with that."

The anger receded from Tommy's eyes as he accepted the amelioration

"Thank...you...old...man..."

"You can thank me when I get us outta this hellhole... Can you walk?"

Not bothering to wait for the slow motion response, Taskmaster helped Speed up to his feet and they slowly made their way to where the guards had appeared from.

 

As they rounded the corner, so did another group of ten more soldiers

Speed slowly balled his fists, but Taskmaster laid his hand over it and scolded him

"Now now, leave this to the professional"

Taskmaster moved to stand in front of Tommy as he whipped out his bow once again.

"That fool, Clint, always thinks he’s such a genius for bringing his trick arrows. Well, it was about time someone took him to task... Watch and learn"

With that, pulled out an arrow, nocked it, and aimed it towards the crowd of soldiers, the arrow left in a beautiful arc only to fall right in front of soldiers

"You...misssed..."

"I never miss, kid"

With that the detonator activated, blowing the soldiers to smithereens

_Couldn't have asked for better timing on that_

Tasky shot the kid a cocky grin...err tried to

_Still wearing a mask, genius_

_"Let's go"_

 

The duo slowly made their way past the small crater the explosion had left, and the deftly stepped over what remained of their opponents. As they turned the next corner however a sense of deja vu washed over both of them.

"Been...here...before..."

Taskmaster looked straight ahead and saw the gaping hole in the wall he had left before

_How in the hell??_

The facility was turning into an Escher painting, becoming an ever changing labyrinth to trap its prey.

_This definitely wasn't in the blueprints_

  _Oh yeah the blueprints! Think Tasky!_

"Give me a sec, I'll think of something, kid"

"Take...Your...Time..."

"You know sarcasm doesn't translate well into slowmo-enese right"

 

"Damage to the structure carries over no matter where they move the corridors...Okay kid we need to check something, follow me"

They moved towards the gaping hole in the wall, but the staircase wasn't behind it. Instead it was some sort of research lab. It smelled like formaldehyde and there were beakers and test tubes and lots of sciency looking stuff

"Okay so the staircase isn't here, that means the rooms are probably stationary and the hallways move somehow, So we don't need to find an exit, we can make our own. We just need a room that has the outside on the other side of it..."

_Like the room with the safe._

_"_ Time to beat this maze at its own game, kid." He said as he excitedly took the tired teen's hand and led him out of the lab. They made their way down through the twisting corridors again, finding the craters from Speed's onslaught a few times, and the one from Tasky's exploding arrow as well. Finally they came upon the hole in the wall again. Luckily, they hadn't run across any guards again.

The good news: it actually was the room with the safe so they wouldn't have to search the labyrinth for it again

The bad news: it was full of guards. Like actually full. The dresser that he'd punched earlier seemed to be a cloning device. And guards kept pouring out of it.

_Are you fucking kidding me? The safe has nada but the freaking dresser's a cloning device??_

 

Before the guards knew they were being attacked, Taskmaster went to town.

First, he fired an arrow into the dresser's machinery to shut down the reinforcements. Instead of two against infinity, it was now just two against 300.

Luckily the guards had to funnel out through the doorway, which greatly reduced the effectiveness of their superior odds. Taskmaster fired his last exploding arrow  into the back as he moved to the doorway and unsheathed his sword. The morons in the doorway shielded him from any projectiles the ones in the back could fire, so he just had to pick them off in melee combat one on one. Which isn't a daunting task in the slightest when you have the fighting style's of Sif and Black Knight memorized.

_We're actually gonna make it! I don't believe it!_

No sooner had he thought that thought before a crashing sound was heard from within the room

_I don't believe it!_

Walking through the walls came a horde of Speeds. There was definitely something off about them, but it was hard to pinpoint. Some stayed back in the room, some of them turned on their fellows, but mostly they went after the duo.

 _Sure was nice knowing you kid, might as well go out swinging though_...

He swung his sword towards the superpowered attackers but it's hard to hit a speedster with a sword...

 _Wait!_ _They have superpowers? But they're clones of him so that means..._

Tommy must've had the same thought too because he gave Tasky a thumbs up before shouting

"I'll take care of the me's you take care of everyone else"

Speed sped into one of the clones, slamming it into the wall with a wicked right cross. The next one he just tripped and he took a nosedive at mach speed which ain't pretty.

 _Kid can handle himself, now back to fighting for my life_.

He brought his sword up in time to parry one guard's thrust, he followed it up with a riposte that slit the guard's throat. Apparently the guards had realized that firearms were useless while they were acting as a meatshield for their targets so all of them had swapped their guns out for swords. Well most of them had swords. One of them just had just tried to crush his skull with a morningstar, the swing had too much torque and ended up crashing into the doorframe instead.

_Amateur, I'm taking that if we make it out alive though._

The bodies had been piling up relentlessly by now, causing the attackers to have to climb over their brethren to even reach the doorway, giving Taskmaster plenty of time to assess his targets and defend accordingly. He took a split second to check on Tommy-

A mostly flesh colored blur slammed an iridescent green blur into the ground and then pirouetting a kick into another incoming green blur

There seemed to be about twenty or so slaughtered speedsters strewn about the hallway, it was hard to make distinctions between one blur and another but if he had to guess, he'd say there were about a dozen of the clones left

_Can't let the twerp show me up, gonna have to go on the attack instead of defending the doorway_

 

With a roar, Taskmaster shoved his sword into the stomach of the nearest guard, he used that opening to rush inside the room - which caught his attackers off guard. He used that hesitation to his advantage. He slammed his shield into the bridge of one guard's nose, as he recoiled he launched his shield towards the wall. It wasn't vibranium like Cap's shield, but it would still do the trick. It bounced off the wall and into the gut of a guard trying to draw his gun. Before ricocheting down into the ground and into the crotch of another. There were enough guards in this room that shield could pretty much bounce completely at random and still incapacitate any number of guards. Taskmaster lunged for the sword he'd lodged in some sod's chest, then spinning about in an arc, slitting four guards throats simultaneously

_That's why you don't clone the same guard, they're all the exact same height_

As his shield made a  rebound towards Taskmaster's new position, he crunched his fist into one guard's gut, opened his fist and caught the shield, before uppercutting it through the guard's jawline. As he landed he rolled to the left and threw the shield to the rightmost wall as he became upright, the last guard had caught on and caught the shield within both his hands. He died with a stupid grin on his face as Taskmaster's arrow pierced his heart.

Panting heavily, Taskmaster retrieved his shield just as Speed slammed the last of his clones into the wall behind him.

"Not too bad for an old man" quipped Tommy as he looked over at the corpses in the room

"Not too bad for someone fresh out of preschool" retorted Taskmaster, which earned him an outstretched tongue from the speedster.

 

He motioned for Tommy to stay back as he planted the C4 against the wall, and they both hid in the doorway behind his shield as the explosion demolished the only thing between them and the open air. As the dust settled, the pair climbed over the rubble and breathed in the fresh air.

"So what now?" asked Tommy?

"Hell if I know? Wanna rob a bank or something"

"Yeah! Sounds fun!"

 

"Hey stop eyeing my chest you little pervert, my eyes are up here!" joked Taskmaster

"Yeah, that's the problem- you're too tall how am I supposed to crane my neck that far up?"

 

With that the two of them left the sirens of the facility, and made their way across the countryside.


End file.
